George Was There

August 29, 1988

WHERE WAS George? That is the question being asked by critics of the Republican nominee for president.

I know where George Bush was in 1944-45. He was flying a Navy combat plane from the deck of an aircraft carrier. On one mission he was shot down in the Pacific. Fortunately for the nation he was rescued.

We use John Wayne types as a model for our heroes, but while Wayne was safe in Hollywood making war movies, George was at war making it possible for all those to be able to ask ''Where was George?''

It took a special kind of courage, a special kind of person to fly combat missions from the deck of a carrier, and George Bush was one of the best.